1. Welcome & Introductions
The group welcomed Lee Hilyer from the University of Houston.

2. New Chair Volunteer
Tom Moran volunteered to be the new Working Group Chair. He will be invited to the TexShare Advisory Board meetings to give a report if applicable. Thanks Tom!

3. Discussion on policy for distance education students
One of the university libraries has been mailing out thousands of cards and brochures a semester for the last several years to their off-campus students. We’re having a little bit of a problem sending that many cards and brochures at one time. We really appreciate that they are actively promoting the program to their students, but we do have to pay for the printing of the supplies and would not be able to support other schools doing this to the same extent. At this point, they don’t have any idea of the number of students who actually use the TexShare card. We would like to be able to show some sort of “return on the investment.”

One solution the group suggested was to put the new Card brochure up on the TexShare web site so libraries could print their own. That would save us some printing costs. Another suggestion was to have the school send each distance education student a brochure (by mail or email), and then have the student request a TexShare Card if they have an interest in using the program. That way the library would have a better idea of how many of the students might actually be using the card. Besides saving printing costs, this is also a “greener” approach. Ann will pass this idea onto the university.

4. Discussion on Program Agreement forms and the new mobile app for lending policies project
We’re working on mobile capability for the TexShare web pages, and one of the things that will come out of this project is that the Card lending policies will be available via mobile technology. One of the first things that needs to be done is to make sure all the lending policies currently on our web site are up-to-date. At this time, when a library updates a card lending policy on our web site, the TexShare Card Program Participation Agreement Form comes up automatically. If a library is just updating the policy, we don’t require that they get a new signature and mail or fax it in. Staff is wondering if it would be worth it to require all libraries in the program to sign up again as we start fresh for this project. The working group suggested that we ask all the libraries to renew their commitment to the card program by signing the form when they finish reviewing their current lending policies. They suggested we do this online. Ann and her team will look into making this happen.

5. Review of Card statistics history
Ann completed Excel charts reviewing the statistics from both the public and academic libraries in the Card program from FY05 through FY10 (see charts below). The statistics include: total number of cards issued, total number of borrows, and total cost of borrows (cost avoidance). These are the statistics we use for the report to the legislative budget board each year.

6. Affiliate Members and the Card program
Ann briefly explained the new affiliate TexShare membership category, and then mentioned that we might be having new affiliate members joining the Card program in the future.

7. Affiliate Mentoring Program Pilot
TSLAC will ask TexShare member libraries to volunteer to assist new affiliate members through a TexShare Mentoring program. A mentoring program could help new members to:

Fulfill the roles and responsibilities of TexShare members

Take advantage of all the benefits of TexShare services for which they have signed up

Communicate effectively with their administration and/or boards about the advantages of sharing library resources

Promote the use of TexShare services among their users

Appropriately balance their responsibilities to local users and their responsibilities to the consortium

If the mentoring program is successful, we will consider expanding mentoring to current members who would like to have a more active role in the consortium.

8. Next Steps

Put new Card brochure up on TexShare web site

Enable electronic signatures for the renewal of the card agreement form